This article is part three of a six-part series by Gary Deddo on interpreting Scripture. For part one, click here. For part two, click here.

Guidelines for approaching Scripture reverently with prayer by faith

Since, as we have been discussing, Scripture is the gift of God, where God has graciously promised to speak to us through his living Word, what, then, are some guidelines for approaching it? I think the first thing needing to be said is that we must approach it reverently with a desire to be addressed, to hear a word from God. This attitude is probably best demonstrated when we start with prayer to God, the God of the Bible. In prayer we acknowledge that we look for and anticipate receiving a word from God himself, that is, hearing from the Living Word through the written word by the Spirit. It shows we are ready to listen, to hear. And we express in prayer that we want to hear what the Lord has to say to us. That is, we listen as his children, as his sheep, not as one of his advisers or as an engineer might seek impersonal information about some empirical object or law of physics perhaps to use for some other purpose.

In prayer, we also acknowledge that we depend upon the Lord and his grace to speak in a way that we can receive. That is, we listen by faith, as we trust that the Lord does speak and knows how to get through to us, the dumb sheep! Listening to Scripture as God’s holy word is an act of faith in the God whose word it is. We read or listen to Scripture by faith in the grace of God, just as we do in every other response of ours to God. We listen and study Scripture by faith.

This means that we do not put our trust in our techniques for studying the Bible no matter how simple or how sophisticated they are. And we aren’t just mining for data, for information, for formulas or principles or for truths that we can possess or use for our own ends or purposes. In prayer we place ourselves before the living Lord trusting that he will make himself known to us and enable us to hear and follow him wherever he takes us. Faithful prayer to the Living God of the Bible is essential for our preparation for listening to Scripture.

God’s agenda, not ours

Second, listening to Scripture as God speaking to us means letting it set the agenda for us, according to the nature and purposes God has for giving us the gift of his word. This means that we’ll come to Scripture not to give us, first, exactly what we’re looking for, such as answers to our current or even pressing questions, but to show us what the right questions are and what issues have priority in God’s view. We will not force Scripture to answer questions that it is not designed to answer nor give priority to some concern or issue we have that does not match with the priorities and central matters of Scripture itself. We’ll be open to having our mind reshaped to reflect the mind of Christ and what he views as of first-order importance.

The primacy of the WHO? question

And what is the central thrust of biblical revelation? It is to make known the identity, character, heart, purpose and nature of God. Scripture is primarily designed to answer the question, “Who is God?” So our primary question in reading and listening to Scripture ought to be, “Who are you, Lord?” That’s the first and most important question that ought to be on our hearts and minds as we study Scripture. No matter what passage we’re dealing with, our primary concern ought to be: “What is God telling me about himself in this passage?”

We’ll need to put in second place our questions of What? How? Why? When? and Where? In fact, these questions can only be rightly answered by putting the Who? question first. In many church settings the most difficult question needing to be put on the back burner is this: “What am I supposed to be doing for God?” We are so anxious to discover what God wants us to do for him that we often overlook the most foundational aspect of Scripture which involves revealing, clarifying and reminding us of God’s nature, character, heart, purpose and aim. It’s far more important to know who it is we’re obeying, than to attempt to do the right thing. In fact, we can’t even accurately discern what God wants us to do, and in what way to do it, unless we act out of knowing and trusting in this God according to who he is. Only then will our attitude and motives and the character of our actions match or bear witness to God’s own character. Only then will we find that his commandments are not burdensome and that his yoke is easy and his burden is light. So we need to read the Bible and listen to preaching in order to see more deeply into who God is.

I should also add that the greatest and most damaging deception we can fall into is being misled about the nature and character of God. Being misled or deceived about who God is undermines our faith, which is in turn the foundation of our whole response to God. With our faith or trust in God undermined or twisted, all the rest will collapse too: our worship, our prayer, our listening to Scripture, our obedience, our hope and our love for God and for neighbor. Our faith is a response to who we perceive God to really be. When that is properly aligned, then the Christian life is enlivened and energized even under difficult situations. When it is distorted, we then attempt to run the Christian life with ropes tangled around our feet. So being reminded daily of the truth of who God is must be our top priority—matching the priority of the structure and aim of both the written and the Living Word of God.

Jesus Christ, the Center of the center

Third, as we do so, we’ll have as the center and norm of our knowledge and trust in God all of what Scripture says about Jesus Christ. Oriented to this living Center of the center, we’ll want to see how the Old Testament points and prepares us to recognize him. Jesus Christ is God’s answer to the Who question—in person, in time and space, in flesh and blood—that ancient Israel sought to know. In Jesus Christ, “What you see is what you get.” In him the whole God is personally present, active and speaking. Jesus is the interpretive key to all of Scripture, for in him we see and hear the heartbeat of God. We watch and hear the motions of his heart and mind, even his Spirit, the Holy Spirit. The light we find shining forth from the face of Jesus sheds light on all of Scripture, for in him the God of the whole Bible has personally revealed himself.

So we ought to read and interpret Scripture in a way that through it all, in one way or another, we come to see how it points towards and finds its fulfillment in Jesus Christ. Think of this as a process much like reading a murder mystery novel for the second time. The first time through, at the end, you finally come to discover “who done it.” The second time through is a much different experience. You can see in a new light how all the clues early on in the mystery pointed to “who done it.” You appreciate the clues (and recognize the false leads) even more the second time through. But the clues are not the solution. Their value is how they indicate or are signs pointing to the resolution of the mystery.

This means that central to our study and understanding of the whole Bible should be the person and acts of Jesus. This calls for giving a certain priority to and focus on the Gospels. This does not mean narrowing our attention simply to the words or teaching of Jesus, as some “red letter” Bibles might tempt us to do. Rather, this means placing at center stage all of what the Gospels tell us about who Jesus is. This will include his own words, actions and self-interpretations (think, for example, of all the “I am” statements in John), but also make use of those texts that answer most directly who Jesus is, not only in the Gospels but also throughout the rest of the New Testament.

Who Jesus is in relationship to the Father and the Holy Spirit

As we prayerfully begin to listen to Scripture concentrating on the Who question as answered by God himself in Jesus, you’ll find that the primary way Jesus is identified involves his relationship to God the Father and God the Holy Spirit. The answer to the Who? question is intrinsically bound up with grasping the nature, character, purpose and aim of Jesus in relationship with the Father and Spirit. For Jesus primarily and consistently identifies himself by means of those relationships. He is the one sent from the Father, the one who has been eternally with and eternally loved by the Father. He is the One who has the Spirit and who has come to give us his Holy Spirit.

The highest concentration on the importance of Jesus’ relationships with the Father and Spirit comes in the Gospel of John, reaching the apex in John 17. To know Jesus is to know the Father. To know the Father means recognizing who Jesus is. Interacting with Jesus means dealing directly and personally with the Father and the Spirit.

So in our Bible study and preaching we must pay attention to the quality and nature of Jesus’ relationship and interactions with the Father and Spirit. For he is, in his being, the Son of the Father, one with his Spirit. Pay special attention to anywhere in Scripture where we’re given insight into the relationships of the Father, Son and Spirit. For in those relationships we will see and hear most directly, personally and concretely who the God of the Bible is. And in returning to that living Center of the center, again and again we’ll find our faith nourished and growing with a life of joyful obedience flowing out of it.

With the Center of our prayer, faith, devotion and worship set, as a kind of North Star, everything else regarding listening to and studying the Lord’s Scripture gets properly oriented.

Following is a sermon outline that expands on the message of Holy Week and the season of Easter concluding with Pentecost. It was written by GCI, Philadelphia member John Kossey.

Hosanna Precedes Hallelujah

In this sermon we’ll remember the old, old story of Jesus and his love—his love for us unto death on the cross. Hosanna and hallelujah are distinct emotional exclamation points that help us understand what Jesus has done for us.

1. The core message

To the vain, “know it all” Corinthians, Paul focused, “not on lofty words of wisdom,” but “decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified” (1 Corinthians 2:1–2, NRSV throughout except as noted). What Paul regarded “as of first importance,” was that “Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures, and that he was buried, and that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures” (1 Corinthians 15:3–4). Paul explained to the Galatians, “I have been crucified with Christ….It was before your eyes that Jesus Christ was publicly exhibited as crucified” (Galatians 2:19; 3:1). And John praised Jesus as “the slain Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world! (John 1:29), of whom it is declared: “For you were slaughtered and by your blood you ransomed for God saints from every tribe and language and people and nation; you have made them to be a kingdom and priests serving our God…” (Revelation 5:9–10).

Anticipating his death, resurrection and ascension, Jesus made provision for “another Advocate” to be with his disciples “forever” (John 14:16). That Advocate, the Holy Spirit, promised Jesus, “will teach you everything, and remind you of all that I have said to you” (14:26). The Spirit, who abides in and among the people of God (John 14:17), inspired John to devote considerable attention to the final week of Jesus’ earthly life (chapters 12 through 20). Indeed, the Spirit illuminates significant aspects of Jesus’ journey to the cross–a journey that, according to some theological scholars, included the entirety of our Lord’s life here in earth.

2. Jesus the Nazorean

Soldiers who came to arrest Jesus asked twice for “Jesus the Nazorean” (John 18:5, 7 margin)—the same title that Pilate had written and placed on the cross in multiple languages (“Jesus the Nazorean, King of the Jews”; John 19:19 margin). Jesus even used this title after His resurrection:

• “I fell to the ground and heard a voice saying to me, ‘Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?’ I answered, ‘Who are you, Lord? Then he said to me, ‘I am Jesus of Nazareth [margin: the Narzorean] whom you are persecuting’” (Acts 22:7-8).

In the four gospels, John and Matthew use nazōraios whereas Mark and Luke prefer nazarēnos. After Herod’s death following the slaughter of the infants, Joseph departed Egypt and returned to Israel with his family and “made his home in a town called Nazareth, so that what had been spoken through the prophets might be fulfilled, ‘He will be called a Nazorean’”(Matthew 2:23). There is a complication here in that no Old Testament passage relates Nazareth (a town) to a messianic person. However, “Nazareth” has a root meaning in the word “branch” (netser). Qumran writings synonymously link netser with samah. Note these words in Scripture:

• Isaiah 11:1: “A shoot shall come out form the stump of Jesse, and a branch [netser] shall grow out of his roots.”
• Zechariah 6:11-13: “…Thus says the Lord of hosts: Here is a man whose name is Branch [samah]: for he shall branch out in his place, and he shall build the temple of the Lord. It is he that shall build the temple of the Lord; he shall bear royal honor, and shall sit upon his throne and rule.”
• John 2: 19-21: “Jesus answered them, ‘Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.’ The Jews then said, ‘This temple has been under construction for forty-six years, and will you raise it up in three days?’ But he was speaking of the temple of his body.”

John’s Gospel helps us understand the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus as the destruction of his embodied temple and his raising up and inaugurating a personalized temple/Father’s house/household that the Holy Spirit would constitute and continually vitalize: ”

• “‘And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself.’ He said this to indicate the kind of death he was to die” (John 12:32).

Jesus “learned obedience through what he suffered” (Hebrews 5:8). He endured the unspeakable agony of crucifixion, overcame death and the grave and rose victorious through the Father and the Spirit in order to prepare an inclusive “temple of the living God” (2 Corinthians 6:16) for not only his disciples, but ultimately for all humankind. According to one commentator, “The Father’s house will no longer be a construction of stones, but will be a household of many interpersonal relationships, many dwellings, where the Divine Presence can dwell with believers.”

In accord with the title Pilate had written, Jesus the Nazorean is our temple of divine glory and the messianic temple builder of God’s presence (see John 1:14; 2:21; 17:23 and 1 Corinthians 6:19). Hallelujah—praise God!

3. The Lamb of God

Let’s read John’s account of Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem, days after he had raised Lazarus from the grave (the following translation is from Anchor Bible, chapter 12:9–19, emphasis added):

Now the large crowd of the Jews found out that that he was there and came out, not only because of Jesus, but also to see Lazarus whom he had raised from the dead. The chief priests, however, planned to kill Lazarus too, because on his account many of the Jews were going over to Jesus and believing in him. The next day the large crowd that had come for the feast, having heard that Jesus was to enter Jerusalem, got palm fronds and came out to meet him. They kept on shouting: “Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the Lord’s name! Blessed is the King of Israel!” But Jesus found a young donkey and sat on it. As the Scripture has it: “Do not be afraid, O daughter of Zion! See, your king comes to you seated on a donkey’s colt.” At first, the disciples did not understand this; but when Jesus had been glorified, then they recalled that it was precisely what had been written about him that they had done to him. And so the crowd which had been present when Jesus called Lazarus out of the tomb and raised him from the dead kept testifying to it. This was [also] why the crowd came out to meet him: because they heard that he had performed this sign. At that the Pharisees remarked to one another, “You see, you are getting nowhere. Look, the world has run off after him.”

Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem took place on 10 Abib/Nisan. Moses passed instructions to Israel to select a male lamb (sheep or goat) on day 10 of Abib/Nisan for sacrifice late on 14 Nisan before or through twilight (Exodus 12:3–6). Not only did these days afford time to verify that the lamb was without blemish and suitable for sacrifice, the family could and did become attached to their lamb, not just any lamb. By the time of Jesus, rabbinic tradition called for the high priest to go out through the North Gate of Jerusalem sometime after the morning sacrifice to select the best of the best yearling for the Passover. A considerable procession of priests would ceremoniously line the streets to honor the high priest’s return with the perfect sacrificial lamb. Meanwhile, a crowd who had witnessed the raising of Lazarus accompanied Jesus on his way to Jerusalem. Crowds of people who had heard about this unprecedented miracle—imparting life to Lazarus who had been dead for four days—poured out of Jerusalem’s East Gate, eager to see the Coming One. The crowds grew confident, reasoning that since Jesus had power to raise the dead (and feed a large crowd, John 6:14), “the prophet who is to come into the world” could surely free the Jews from Caesar’s brutal oppression.

The people of Jerusalem were selecting their Messiah-King at the time that Caiaphas the high priest was seeking the perfect Passover lamb during daylight of 10 Nisan.

• John 12:13: “So they took branches of palm trees and went out to meet him, shouting, ‘Hosanna! Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord—the King of Israel!’”

Hosanna is literally either hosha na or the longer compound, hoshiah na—“save now” or “save, please.” The Greek word for hosanna is a transliteration of Hebrew, not a translation.

• Psalm 118:25–26: “Save us, we beseech you, O Lord! [hoshiah-na] O Lord, we beseech you, give us success! Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord. We bless you from the house of the Lord.”

Some of the crowds were crying out to select Jesus as their new King of Israel. The psalm says nothing about a nationalistic king. And the use of palm branches to greet a potential liberator evoked or suggested Maccabean nationalism. Crowds that pleaded for Jesus to save them from Roman brutality as king of the Jews turned on him just days later. And before Pilate, Jesus asserted, “My kingdom is not from this world” (John 18:36).

At this point Jesus enacts his true identity by seating himself on a donkey, not riding militantly on a horse into Jerusalem. His purpose is to undergo crucifixion, death and resurrection in order to draw all humankind to himself as worldwide Messiah. His raising of Lazarus promised the gift of life not just for Israel but for people across the earth.

Jesus did not enter Jerusalem as a “triumphal entry” of kingly hallelujah that brought an immediate political solution for Israel. Instead, Jesus chose a “donkey entry” of hosanna—saving the whole world that the Father loves by submitting to crucifixion and death.

Points to Ponder

• The distinction between hallelujah—Praise God!; and hosanna—Save/help us, please!; has become blurred through the centuries. Music and messages typically assume they mean the same concept. Hosanna is an urgent plea, petition, or cry for help. Hallelujah is a grateful exclamation of praise to God (see “Hosanna” in Anchor Bible Dictionary, 3:290–291).

• We can learn anew that Jesus the Nazorean is “King of kings and Lord of lords” (Revelation 19:16) because he faithfully obeyed God the Father through suffering unto death on the cross. He has incorporated us, through the Spirit-Paraclete, into the temple of the living God.

• Jesus refused to become just another temporal king of the Jews, despite the pleading hosannas from Jerusalem’s Passover crowds. They urged him to become a liberating king on 10 Nisan, when Passover lambs were being selected.

• Reflect upon our need to exclaim, “Hosanna!” to “the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world” (John 1:29). He gave himself to public scrutiny, scorn, suffering, desolate rejection and humiliating crucifixion to be lifted up and glorified. In our urgent need, let us remember the concise prayer, “Hosanna!”—“Save [or help], please!”

• Instead of saving himself from the cross, “Christ through the eternal Spirit, offered himself without blemish to God” (Hebrews 9:14).

Hosanna precedes hallelujah. Praise God!

GCI in the Philippines recently adopted a Discipleship Pathway for use in their churches. “D-Star,” as it is called, was designed by GCI Philippine’s National Director Eugene Guzon (pictured at right with his wife) with assistance from the national office leadership team. It is a five-step journey of coming to know Christ and then growing up in Christ: (1) Connect, (2) Community, (3) Convert, (4) Commit and (5) Commission.

Each step in the D-Star pathway is fully centered on Jesus, who, in accordance with GCI’s Incarnational, Trinitarian theology, is understood to be at work, through the Spirit, with all people—leading them to conversion and on to maturity as one of his followers. The goal of D-Star is to follow in step with the Spirit, helping people take each step on the journey with Jesus–eventually becoming active participants in our Lord’s Great Commission work (Matthew 28:18-20; Acts 1:8).

This is, of course, a journey of faith, by which each believer shares, through Christ, in God’s promise to Abraham: “I will bless you and make your name great,” so that, “in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed” (Genesis 12:1-3). As children of Abraham, we participate by faith in what Jesus is doing in the power of the Spirit to fulfill the Father’s mission to the world.

For more about our calling as churches to participate in Jesus’ disciplemaking work, go to http://mindev.gci.org/strategy.htm.

This article is part two of a six-part series by Gary Deddo on interpreting Scripture. Click here for part one.

In the first article in this series, we considered how Scripture is a gift of the living and speaking God. But this gift is not one that becomes separated from the giver. By the Spirit God spoke through the prophets and then the apostles. But God continues to speak by the same Spirit through those God-breathed written words. In fact if God fell mute, and ceased to actively communicate to us in and through those written words, we would not have a true and authoritative word from God by which he makes himself known. But the living and speaking God of the Bible does not remain at a deistic distance, winding up his Bible and then sending it out to mechanistically convey information about God.

The very nature of God is to communicate himself, making himself known, so that we might communicate with him as his children and so share in holy loving communion.

One further point, made in part one of this series, confirms all this. God’s personal act of communication is in and through his Son, the Living Word. The whole of the written words of the prophets and apostles direct our attention to the Living Word, Jesus the incarnate Son of God. This Jesus is God’s own self-communication, his own self-revelation to us. Jesus does not give us words from God, he is himself God’s Word to us. He expresses the very character of God as a speaking and communicating God. To hear Jesus is to hear God himself speaking to us, directly, in person, face-to-face.

So Jesus is at the center of the written word, Scripture. But he is behind all the words, the whole of the Bible, as its source, as the speech of God to us. He is the original Word and the final Word of God, the Alpha and Omega. In other words, by the incarnation of the Word of God the author of the written word of God has come into the play, he has shown up in the person of Jesus. And as the author, Jesus himself indicates that he is at the center and behind it all. So when the Pharisees attempt to use Scripture (and their interpretation of it against Jesus), he confronts them and says: “You search the scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life and it is they that testify on my behalf. Yet you refuse to come to me to have life” (John 5:39-40, NRSV throughout). Jesus has to tell them that he is the author [Lord] of the Sabbath (Luke 6:5) and that they are in no place to judge him by their pre-understanding of the Sabbath. When the author of Scripture shows up, we have to stop interpreting Jesus in terms of our pre-understandings of Scripture and interpret the written words in terms of Jesus, the Living Word.

Through his interaction with the men on the road to Emmaus after his resurrection, Jesus instructs us how to approach the written word of God. To help these disciples understand who he was and what he had gone through, this is what he did: “Then beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them the things about himself in all the scriptures” (Luke 24:27). A bit later he explained to them: “’These are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you—that everything written about me in the law of Moses, the prophets, and the psalms must be fulfilled.’ Then he opened their minds to understand the scriptures” (Luke 24:44-45).

The written word of God is to be interpreted in the light of the Living Word, for the purpose of the written word is to direct us to the Living Word so that we might know who God is and what he has done for us. When we approach all of Scripture with Jesus himself as the interpretive key to it all, then we hear the word of God as it was meant to be heard. Thomas F. Torrance used to explain it this way: It’s like reading a murder-mystery for the second time. The first time we’re looking for clues as to “who-done-it.” But not everything is clear. Some things make sense others don’t. Some things seem significant, others seem trivial. But in a well-crafted murder mystery there will be plenty of clues—so many clues that when it finally is revealed who committed the crime, we are somewhat surprised but also satisfied that it makes sense. We say, “Yes there were clues all along. We just didn’t know which ones to pay attention to and didn’t see how they ‘added up.'”

Now, what would happen if we were to read the murder mystery for a second time? Now knowing “who-done-it,” those early clues would not be irrelevant. Rather we would see how truly significant they were. We would be able to sort out the irrelevant clues from the meaningful ones. Those clues would stand out as even more extraordinary. “No wonder suspect A said X. No wonder suspect B did Y.” We would see what they mean; how they point to who committed the crime. We would end up valuing those clues as foreshadowings even more than on the first reading.

And that’s much what it’s like when properly reading the Bible. Knowing it all leads to what God has done in Jesus Christ, we don’t set that recognition aside. Rather we interpret the whole of the written word in terms of its center, the Living Word of God. In that way, the whole of Scripture is properly interpreted; the gift of God is properly received.

Another way to say all this is that the Bible itself tells us whose Scripture this is. We know who the author is. We know where the Bible came from. It is not anonymous. So another analogy would be that reading the Bible is like reading a letter from someone you know and who knows you, not like getting junk mail from someone you don’t know and who doesn’t know or care about you. Reading these two types of mail are entirely different experiences, aren’t they? Sometimes when I’ve gotten letters (or emails) from those I know well, as I read what they wrote, I can almost hear their voices. I know just how they’d say it. It sounds “just like them.” Reading the Bible should be like that. The more we get to know the heart, mind, purpose and attitudes of Jesus, the more we’ll hear his voice throughout all of Scripture and see how it points to him the Son, and to his mission as the self-revelation of the Father and the Spirit.

When reading and trying to understand Scripture out of the center of knowing whose scripture it is, another aspect of a proper approach becomes apparent. The primary purpose of all of Scripture is to reveal to us who this God is. That is, central to the message of all the biblical writers is to convey to us the nature, character, purpose and attitudes of our Creator and Redeemer God. They want us above all to know not just that some kind of god exists, but which God in particular and what this God is like. And they want their hearers to know who God is because the God they know wants to be known and is working though them to accomplish just that.

But the revelation that God is accomplishing is not just aimed at a kind of abstract, impersonal information. It is knowledge that reveals a God who has created us for relationship, communication and holy love. Knowing this God involves interaction of faith, trust, praise, adoration, worship and so fellowship and communion, which includes our following in his ways; that is, our obedience. And this interaction is not just a “knowing about” but a knowing in a sense similar to how we hear of Adam “knowing” Eve and so conceiving a child. By God’s acts of revelation, we come to know deeply who this God really is. Love for this God, the worship of this God, trust or faith in this God are our responses to who this God is. True knowledge of God that is accurate and faithful leads to true worship and living trust in God.

Throughout the Old Testament, the most often and widely repeated description of God’s nature and character is his “steadfast love.” In the Psalms alone, the Lord’s steadfast love is highlighted nearly 120 times. Psalm 136 uniquely proclaims God’s steadfast love in the refrain of all its 26 verses. An expanded but slightly more comprehensive description found across the Old Testament echoes what the Lord revealed of himself to Moses: “The LORD, the LORD, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness.” The Old Testament prophets constantly held out to their hearers the nature and character of God, the only one worthy of their faithfulness and worship. However, the fullness of what God’s steadfast love means does not come into full view until we see it embodied and lived out in the incarnation, life, death, resurrection and ascension of Jesus with his promise to return.

Jesus himself made inquiring about and knowing who he was of paramount importance. His teachings and actions are designed to raise the question: “Who then is this?” His parables prompted his hearers to inquire more deeply. And of course, Jesus even confronts his own disciples with this question at two levels: “Who do people say that I am?” and then even more pointedly “Who do you say that I am?” (Mark 8:27, 29 ). Jesus himself makes the question of Who central. We must do the same if we are to hear the Word of God (Living and so written) as it was meant to be heard.

What is disclosed in Jesus and preserved for us in the responses of the apostles and their writings is that God is not just graciously loving towards us, but is Father, Son and Holy Spirit who have their being in triune holy loving from all eternity, before there ever was a creation. Jesus is who he is in his eternal relationship of holy love to the Father and eternal Spirit. That is the deepest level of God’s self-revelation, where we discover who God is in God’s inner and eternal triune life.

So we should approach our Bible study with our primary goal being listening and learning from Scripture who our triune God is as revealed to us in Jesus Christ. We can then rightly interpret Scripture out of that center. This approach means that other questions we might like to ask first, or about which we might be anxious, will be secondary. For Scripture, with Jesus at the center, not only provides us with certain answers, it tells us what the right questions are! So the questions of What?, Where?, When?, Why? or How? must be made relative to the question of Who? For it is the key to all these other questions.

We now have laid out the basic orientation for our understanding of Scripture and how best to approach it. We will consider some further implications for listening to the Word of God in our next installment.

Below is a video produced by NewLife Fellowship showing a sermon that Dan Rogers gave on Easter in Southern California. It serves as a source of sermon ideas and an example of expository preaching.

http://youtu.be/M4q7F-Ygzyg

Through Church Multiplication Ministries, GCI is making significant progress in forming district-level church planting networks where existing GCI churches partner to recruit, equip and support men and women called by God to start new GCI churches in the US. Following is a report on one of those networks from district pastor Glen Weber. Following that is a video of a presentation on church planting networks given by Hal Haller at a recent GCI church planting conference.

The four GCI district pastors in Southern California (affectionately called the “Quad”) have been gathering monthly for some time to pray with and coach each other. One of the topics that kept coming to our attention was church planting. We had talked and prayed about it quite often and finally Pastor Heber Ticas said, “We need to stop talking so much and begin to actually do something to participate with Jesus in church planting.” We began by supporting Pastor Heber in planting a satellite congregation within the Latino community in Los Angeles from his mother church in San Fernando Valley. That church launched in October 2011 and has been experiencing approximately 70 people in attendance.

Meanwhile we began to pray and search specifically for people with a heart and calling to plant a stand-alone GCI congregation elsewhere in the Los Angeles area. A couple of people expressed interest and we assessed one couple; but it was the wrong time for these individuals. Meanwhile, a GCI pastoral couple (Angie and Saddie Tabin) in the Philippines visited Southern California with a desire to plant a church there among the large Filipino community in Los Angeles. After considerable prayer and discussion we decided this was the Holy Spirit providing the answer to our prayers, even though it was going to take more work and faith than we had planned on. Normally, GCI does not provide salaries to church planters, but to make it possible for the Tabins to get a visa to work in the US, we needed to provide them a salary to get started. That meant raising about $50,000 to cover their salary for about eighteen months (we are still raising those funds). Meanwhile, we had been developing an ability to provide church planter assessment, coaching and other support services.

The Tabins arrived in late June 2012 and hit the ground running, meeting hundreds of people in their focus community. They have developed a network of relationships by giving people day-old bagels, meeting them at the grocery store, visiting them in senior residences, etc. By February 2013 they had made sufficient contacts to invite 130 people to an initial social gathering where their new friends could meet. Over 80 attended and are looking forward to the next gathering in a month or so. After having a couple more gatherings, they will have a preview church service or two, leading up to the launch of their new congregation in October—God willing.

Recently I had the pleasure of attending the GCI Church Multiplication summit held in Memphis, Tennessee. Below is a video of a presentation made there by church planting consultant Hal Haller. By watching this, you’ll get a better idea of church planting networks vision, values and outcomes. I urge other districts to form a network. For assistance, contact Randy.Bloom@gci.org and see the CMM website at http://cmm.gci.org/networks.htm.

http://youtu.be/bTkTOob6zG4

This article is part one of a six-part series by Gary Deddo on interpreting Scripture. For the other parts, click on a number: 2, 3, 4, 5, 6.

The Christian church down through the ages has always regarded the Bible as indispensable for its worship, devotion and life. Its very existence is bound up with it. The church would not be what it is without it. Holy Scripture is part of the air it breathes and the food it eats.

I learned of the importance of the Bible as a young child and was encouraged and taught to read it and memorize it. I studied it both on my own and with others—I’m glad I did, now years later. The study of the Bible has always been an essential part of my ministry in serving others whether it was teaching it, preaching from it, studying it with small groups of other Christians, or referring to it when counseling others. When I attended seminary my primary focus was the study and interpretation of Scripture. It was so important to me that I was willing to try to learn Hebrew and Greek to see if I could understand Scripture better!

Along the way, I learned that there were various ways the nature and place of Scripture was understood and various ways to make use of it. Some of these seemed better than others, while some seemed to lead to the misuse of Scripture, or even to making it irrelevant. I read books and took courses to sort out these issues hoping I could find some wisdom in all this not only to help me, but to pass on to others.

Scripture is so essential to the Christian faith that most denominations have an official statement concerning the importance and place of Scripture. GCI is no exception. These summaries can be a good place to start reflection on the nature, purpose and right use of Scripture. GCI’s statement is brief, to the point and fairly comprehensive:

The Holy Scriptures are by God’s grace sanctified to serve as his inspired Word and faithful witness to Jesus Christ and the gospel. They are the fully reliable record of God’s revelation to humanity culminating in his self-revelation in the incarnate Son. As such, Holy Scripture is foundational to the church and infallible in all matters of faith and salvation.

Let’s explore what’s behind this theological summary of our understanding of Scripture. We do so not so we can enter into endless debate or prove ourselves superior to other Christians who might have a different view. And I don’t think we simply want a theory about it. We seek understanding of Scripture because we highly value it and want to honor and make proper use of it. We want to handle it well so we can get the most out of it. And these very things Holy Scripture itself encourages us to do. We also can recall that others in church history have benefited greatly through a deep understanding of Scripture and how to interpret it. But in the end, I think we want to grasp and use it well because we hope to get to know even better the God of the Bible in whom we put our faith.

By God’s Grace

Many of us have sung the childhood song that says: “Jesus loves me, this I know—for the Bible tells me so.” And that’s true enough. However there’s a different way to sing that verse that is also true: “Jesus loves me this I know—so the Bible tells me so!” This second way is reflected in the GCI statement that the Bible is God’s gift to us, a gift of grace and so of his love. Because God loves us in and through Christ, he has graciously provided us his written Word.

God didn’t have to do so, but his love for us, his creatures, has moved him to provide us with his Word in written form. God’s love for us comes first, then follows his provision of the Bible. We wouldn’t really be able to know and love God if God hadn’t first loved us and communicated to us through his written Word. God gives us his word in Scripture because he loves us and wants us to know that he does. We should always remember that the Bible is God’s gracious gift of love to us.

God Continues to Empower His Word

But that’s not the end of it. Human words in and of themselves don’t have the capacity to reveal to us the truth and reality of God. Human words are just that, human. They derive primarily from our human experiences. But God is not a creature and can’t be simply grasped in creaturely terms, concepts and ideas. Words, when referring to God, don’t mean exactly the same thing as when they refer to creation. So we can say we “love” and we can say God “loves.” But God’s love far exceeds our love. We use the same word, but we don’t mean the same thing when we use it of God compared to when we use it of ourselves. Yet our love can be a dim mirror image of God’s love. So God himself has to sanctify, make holy and adequate, our mere human words so we can use them to accurately and faithfully refer to the God of the Bible and not lead us into misunderstandings of God and his ways.

The God of the Bible is active and continually gracious to us by superintending our reading and interpretation of Scripture, helping us to see how they uniquely make God and his ways known to us. He has not become mute since the Bible came into existence. God continues to speak in and through his written Word, enabling it to refer to him and not just to creaturely ideas or realities. The God of the Bible continues to speak his word to us through this gift of written revelation.

If God ceased to be personally involved and stopped empowering the written word to accomplish the miraculous feat of enabling us to know him, then God would not be truly known. We would simply have human and creaturely ideas about God to consider and nothing more. The result would likely be not much better than the ancient Greek and Roman mythological gods.

Inspired by the Spirit

If we ask, “How has God spoken and made himself known to us?” it turns out that this work involves the whole of God, that is, the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. The word “inspired” means “God breathed.” The Holy Spirit is identified as the wind or breath of God. By the Spirit of God, certain people down through the ages were called, appointed and specially enabled to speak authoritatively for God. They were “inbreathed” by the Spirit. How exactly the Spirit works we do not and cannot know. But we have been told that the Spirit can and has empowered first the prophets of the Old Testament and then the apostles of the New Testament.

The Spirit seems to take into account everything about a particular prophetic or apostolic author and graciously makes use of them. The Spirit incorporates their language, culture and social-political background as well as their own relationship with God into his communicative purposes. The Spirit uses the human elements of the selected prophets and apostles. But the Spirit uses these elements in a way that enables them to refer far beyond creaturely realities. The Spirit takes charge of them in a way that gives those words a capacity to communicate that they could never have on their own.

So by the Spirit, Scripture as a whole serves as a written form of communication that God can continually use to make himself and his ways known to his people down through the ages. If the Spirit was not at work with these individuals, we would not have any authoritative and trustworthy access to God’s word. So we can thank God for choosing certain individuals down through the ages and, by his Spirit, inspiring them to speak faithfully for him.

Providential Preservation

We have these written words because they have somehow been preserved for us down through the ages. This too must be regarded as the gracious work and gift of God. Because of his great love for us the God of the Bible not only kicked things off by selecting and inspiring certain individuals, but also by overseeing them being handed on and finally collected together. We call this form of God’s grace his providence.

Apparently an aspect of God’s providential oversight also included some inspired editing of preexisting material. God providentially maintained contact with his written word and with the process by which it was canonized (brought together in an authoritative collection). Of course if the God of the Bible wanted us to have a written witness to his Word, then we shouldn’t be surprised that God would also have to anticipate and secure its preservation down through the ages (you do, after all, have to be pretty smart to be God!).

The Self-Revelation

The gracious gift of revelation as it traces through history does reach a crucial high-point. All the prophetic words prepare for and look forward to the self-revelation of God in Jesus Christ, the Incarnate Son of God. And all the apostolic writings look back to the time and place where God himself, as himself, reveals and interprets himself in and through Jesus Christ.

In Jesus, we don’t have simply another inspired word about God, but the Living Word of God himself, in person—in time and space and in flesh and blood. So Jesus tells us that he is, himself, the Way, the Truth and the Life. He does not show us a way or tell us about the truth or give us things that lead to life. He himself is these things. Thus God’s gracious revelatory work reaches a qualitatively different level with the birth of the Word of God in human form. And, as it turns out, the written word of God’s Spirit-inspired prophets and apostles point to the fulfillment of their own word with the coming of the Living Word.

John the Baptist, as the last of the prophets and representative of them all, serves as an authoritative witness when he points to Jesus as being the Light, the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world, the Messiah and the Son of God (John 1:8; 29-34). John proclaimed that Jesus came before him and is the one who baptizes with the Spirit. Therefore John said he must decrease and Jesus increase, for Jesus is the center of the center of God’s revelatory work and thus stands at the very center of Holy Scripture.

Faithful and Infallible

The written word, derives its authority and faithfulness from the Father, through the Son and in the Spirit. Because God is the living and speaking God, we have a written word that puts us in touch with the Living Word of God, all by the Spirit. The Bible’s authority is established and maintained by a living and real connection of God to the Bible. Scripture can serve as it does because it remains connected to the infallible God. The Bible’s authority and faithfulness is not in itself, apart from God, but in its actual, continuing connection with the Father, Son/Word and Spirit. So when we read or listen to the Bible, we can expect to hear the living, triune God speak to us once again.

Many reading this are putting finishing touches on messages for Maundy Thursday, Good Friday and Easter Sunday. Here are some resources you might find helpful:

• Here is a powerful quote from T.F. Torrance:

“The empty tomb points to the revelation of the virgin birth; it is the unveiling of what was veiled, the resurrection out of our mortality of what was inserted into it and recreated within it. But such a resurrection of true man and true God points back to the virgin birth of Jesus as a union of true God and true man. The humiliation of Jesus began at Bethlehem and reached its climax on the cross, just before his glorification in the resurrection. The new life began at Bethlehem and reached its unveiling in the resurrection. Thus the mystery of the virgin birth is the basis of the mystery of the resurrection. By the mystery of the resurrection the mystery of the virgin birth becomes effective and understandable. Here we have a closed circle—to deny the virgin birth involves a denial of the resurrection, and vice versa” (T.F. Torrance in Incarnation: The Person and Life of Christ, p. 97).

• Christianity Today recently published an article that shows the essential connection of the Incarnation with the Crucifixion and Resurrection. It’s entitled “Vicarious Humanity: By His Birth We Are Healed” and is found online at http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2012/march/by-his-birth-healed.html?paging=off

• Sermon Central recently posted “15 Powerful Quotes for Easter” that quotes from Scripture and various Christian leaders. It is found online at http://www.sermoncentral.com/pastors-preaching-articles/ray-hollenbach-15-powerful-quotes-for-easter-1522.asp.

From time to time here in Weekly Update, we’ll provide sermon outlines for the use of pastors and others in their preaching/teaching responsibilities. The outline below is from John Kossey, a GCI member in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. If you have a sermon outline you would like to share here, email it to Ted.Johnston@gci.org.

Sharing in God’s love for people

(Luke 10:25-37)

Introduction: Christians rightly focus on loving God. But what about loving people? In our culture, it seems that tolerating people has replaced truly loving them. In contrast, our Triune God, who is love, has through the atonement, made self-giving love of neighbor a new-creation distinctive:

• Because of his limitless love, the Father gave up his Son to the world to save the world, not to condemn it (John 3:16–17). Salvation is an expression of our Triune God’s love.>

• 1 John 4: 9–11 NRSV “God’s love was revealed among us in this way: God sent his only Son into the world so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins. Beloved, since God loved us so much, we also ought to love one another.”

• Jesus remains faithful to the Father even through death on the cross to “draw all people to myself” (John 12:32).

• Through the agency of the Holy Spirit, the Father raises the dead-and-entombed Jesus. That act—vindicated by the Spirit (1 Timothy 3:16, margin), displays divine oneness and togetherness as the standard for human oneness and togetherness:

• John 17:20–23 NRSV “I ask not only on behalf of those, but also on behalf of those who will believe in me through their word, that they may all be one. As you, Father, are in me and I am in you, may they also be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me. The glory that you have given me I have given them, so that they may be one, as we are one. I in them and you in me, that they may become completely one, so that the world may know that you have sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.”

• 1 John 1:3 NRSV “We declare what we have seen and heard so that you also may have fellowship with us and truly our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ.”

Body: In Jesus’ Parable of the Good Samaritan, recorded in Luke 10:25-37, we’ll see how God’s loving gift of atonement relates to the lawyer who tried to provoke Jesus. Then we will integrate other passages to understand how atonement has both a “vertical” dimension with our Father and the risen Jesus Christ and a “horizontal” togetherness bonded by mutual love that is Spirit-led and empowered. (We can envision these two dimensions as cross-shaped.) [Read Luke 10:25-37]

• A lawyer tested Jesus about identifying actions for inheriting eternal life. Both the lawyer and Jesus acknowledge the priority of loving God fully and neighbor as oneself as a summary of the Law. The context is looking forward to eternal life. Loving God and neighbor is the essence of self-giving togetherness both in the world to come as well as here and now.

• Jesus responded to the lawyer’s question, “And who is my neighbor?” (v29), with the example of the merciful actions of a Samaritan contrasted with the hands-off avoidance of the priest and Levite. Society’s despised and rejected outcasts paradoxically set the pace in exercising authentic togetherness. According to the prophet Micah: “He has told you, O mortal, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?” (Micah 6:8, NRSV).

• Much like the Samaritan, God exercises divine initiative in graciously giving up his Son, reaching out and touching humanity with his love to deliver humans from sin and death. The very possibility of everlasting togetherness begins with the Father’s outreaching love for the world.

• Jesus, for his own love of neighbor, bears the sin of the world to rescue and deliver humanity. Self-sacrificial love of Jesus brings about a new-creation reality of at-one-ness and togetherness.

• The Spirit leads those whom God calls into union—becoming one—with the risen Christ Jesus. And because we share solidarity and status of children of God and thus co-heirs with Christ Jesus, we also enter into a unity of togetherness with one another through the Spirit. Unity in togetherness and mutual love for one another witness the Gospel to the world. The Holy Spirit is the divine agent that advances communion, participation and togetherness—both with God and with neighbor.

• The Spirit of God (and of Christ as another Paraclete) acts to transfer retrospectively our life into transformed death and resurrection life we share together in union with our Lord Jesus Christ.

• The atonement does not conclude with the death of Jesus on the cross. Paul writes, “For if while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of his Son, much more surely, having been reconciled, will we be saved by his life” (Romans 5:10). His resurrection life includes our living in and by the Spirit of Christ (Romans 8). We engage in neighborly love through the personal presence, leadership and fruit of the Spirit.

• Jesus learned obedience through suffering. He lived fully and authentically human because he was filled with and constantly led by the Spirit. Likewise, believers have the presence and power of the Spirit to keep growing in grace gifts that foster extended togetherness and oneness in the here and now. Communion of faithful, Christ-like togetherness constituted by the Holy Spirit does not indulge in exclusiveness or competition but reaches out to honor the poor, blind, rejected. According to Paul: “This is right and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior, who desires everyone to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth” (1 Tim. 2:3-4, NRSV).

• “Communion of the Holy Spirit” instills vitality, boldness, and fire-in-the-belly passion in our self-giving, love-directed relationships with one another (2 Corinthians 13:13). Think of the Holy Spirit as a personal “soul mate” through whom the Father pours out his love to us (Romans 5:5) and enables that love to flow with our Spirit-empowered love to our neighbors.

• Left alone, humanity tends to be fractured, confused, hateful and self-consuming. The atoning action of God in Christ through the Spirit inaugurates a contrasting alternative of at-one-ness, neighbor-love, and expanding togetherness. In the words of Paul, life “in Christ,” “through the Spirit” is with and for neighbor—an outreaching, joint participation more than isolated individual perspective:

• “faith working in love” (Galatians 5:6)
• “bear one another’s burdens” (Galatians 6:2)
• “new creation” life (2 Corinthians 5:17)
• “all one in Christ Jesus” and free from enslaving social boundaries (Galatians 3:28)
• “lived” and “guided by the Spirit” (Galatians 5:25)
• “led by the Spirit of God” (Romans 8:16)
• encountered “through the rebirth and renewal of the Holy Spirit” (Titus 3:5)

Conclusion: The self-giving love of our Triune God, made evident in the atonement and in the humanity of Jesus, defines for us both the vertical and the horizontal dimensions of love. The Holy Spirit is at work, conforming us to the image of Jesus made evident in our love for people both inside and outside the church. Through the Spirit, we are drawn into, and thus enabled to share in God’s love for our neighbors. It is this love, made real for us in the humanity of Jesus, that fulfills the Law.

On LifeWay’s website (at http://www.lifeway.com/Keyword/easter+sermons?type=learn), there are several Easter season sermon manuscripts posted. They provide some ideas and illustrations that you might find useful for your own sermons and studies during Holy Week.

Here are links to various GCI articles that address Holy Week topics:

• http://www.gci.org/jesus/rejoice
• http://www.gci.org/disc/10-alive
• http://www.gci.org/disc/29-hope
• http://www.gci.org/jesus/celebrating
• http://thesurprisinggodblog.gci.org/2012/04/message-of-holy-week-in-christ-we-are.html
• http://thesurprisinggodblog.gci.org/2013/03/living-in-easter-time.html
• http://trinitarianworship.blogspot.com/2011/04/resurrection-revelation-and-trajectory.html